---
title: "WEB-CMS-012 Drupal Core Past End of Life"
canonical: https://openvapt.com/checks/WEB-CMS-012.html
html: https://openvapt.com/checks/WEB-CMS-012.html
site: OpenVAPT, https://openvapt.com/
license: OpenVAPT Source-Available Licence 1.3, https://openvapt.com/legal/licence-text.html
modified: 2026-10-14
version: 0.1.0-alpha.6
---

# WEB-CMS-012 Drupal Core Past End of Life

Reads the installed Drupal core version from disk and compares its major release with the Drupal security coverage dates.

- Domain: Web Apps
- Severity: High
- Control category: Patch and Vulnerability Management
- Fix effort: high
- CVSS v3.1 vector: `CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:H/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H`
- CIS Controls v8: 2.2
- NIST CSF 2.0: ID.RA-01, PR.PS-02
- CWE: CWE-1104
- OWASP Top 10 2021: A06:2021
- OWASP ASVS 4.0.3: 14.2.1
- NIST SP 800-53 Rev. 5: SI-2, SA-22

## Why It Matters

Drupal 7, 8 and 9 no longer receive security advisories from the Drupal Security Team. Drupalgeddon (CVE-2014-3704) and Drupalgeddon 2 (CVE-2018-7600) showed how quickly unpatched Drupal sites are taken over at scale.

## How It Detects

Reads core/lib/Drupal.php (const VERSION) or includes/bootstrap.inc (define('VERSION')) under each local web root and fails when the major release's end-of-life date has passed: 7 (2025-01-05), 8 (2020-11-02), 9 (2023-11-01).

## How to Fix

Upgrade to a supported Drupal major with composer (drupal/core-recommended), run drush updatedb and test the site; for Drupal 7, migrate with the Migrate module or commission a rebuild.

## How to Verify

```
drush status --field=drupal-version  or  grep VERSION core/lib/Drupal.php
```

## Learn the Theory

- [P6 Information Exposure and Misconfiguration](https://openvapt.com/academy/p6.md)
- [P14 CMS Hardening in Depth: WordPress, Joomla and Drupal](https://openvapt.com/academy/p14.md)
- [A6 Application Framework and CMS Configuration](https://openvapt.com/academy/a6.md)

## References

- [Drupal.org, Drupal core release cycle and end of life](https://www.drupal.org/about/core/policies/core-release-cycles/schedule)
- [NVD, CVE-2018-7600](https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/cve-2018-7600)

## Source Code

https://github.com/OpenVAPT/openvapt/blob/574f7f3333c44b75a3c649e2d93a76d507f75adf/internal/checks/web/cms_depth.go

Run it: `openvapt scan --only WEB-CMS-012`. Read it offline: `openvapt explain WEB-CMS-012`.

---

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